ss.

"Then come--if you care for organ music. The organist is an old friend
of mine, and sometimes he plays for me. He's a dear old man. He had
a degree from Bonn, and was a professor afterward, but he gave up
everything for music. That's he, waiting in the doorway. He looks like
Beethoven, doesn't he? I think he knows that, perhaps and enjoys it a
little. I hope so."

"Yes," said Bibbs, as they reached the church steps. "I think Beethoven
would like it, too. It must be pleasant to look like other people."

"I haven't kept you?" Mary said to the organist.

"No, no," he answered, heartily. "I would not mind so only you should
shooer come!"

"This is Mr. Sheridan, Dr. Kraft. He has come to listen with me."

The organist looked bluntly surprised. "Iss that SO?" he exclaimed.
"Well, I am glad if you wish him, and if he can stant my liddle playink.
He iss musician himself, then, of course."

"No," said Bibbs, as the three entered the church together. "I--I played
the--I tried to play--" Fortunately he checked himself; he had been
about to offer the information that he had failed to master the
jews'-harp in his boyhood. "No, I'm not a musician," he contented
himself with saying.

"What?" Dr. Kraft's surprise increased. "Young man, you are fortunate!
I play for Miss Vertrees; she comes always alone. You are the first. You
are the first one EVER!"

They had reached the head of the central aisle, and as the organist
finished speaking Bibbs stopped short, turning to look at Mary Vertrees
in a dazed way that was not of her perceiving; for, though she stopped
as he did, her gaze followed the organist, who was walking away from
them toward the front of the church, shaking his white Beethovian mane
roguishly.

"It's false pretenses on my part," Bibbs said. "You mean to be kind to
the sick, but I'm not an invalid any more. I'm so well I'm going back
to work in a few days. I'd better leave before he begins to play, hadn't
I?"

"No," said Mary, beginning to walk forward. "Not unless you don't like
great music."

He followed her to a seat about half-way up the aisle while Dr. Kraft
ascended to the organ. It was an enormous one, the procession of pipes
ranging from long, starveling whistles to thundering fat guns; they
covered all the rear wall of the church, and the organist's figure,
reaching its high perch, looked like that of some Lilliputian magician
ludicrously daring the attempt to control a monster certain to overw